Commonplace book

orig. A book in which ‘commonplaces’ or passages important for reference were collected, usually under general heads; hence, a book in which one records passages or matters to be especially remembered or referred to, with or without arrangement.1578 COOPERThesaurus A studious yong man ... may gather to himselfe good furniture both of words and approved phrases ... and to make to his use as it were a common place booke. 1642 FULLERHoly & Prof. St. A Common-place-book contains many notions in garrison, whence the owner may draw out an army into the field.

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Monday, May 02, 2011

They who behold you stare;They peer at you closely:“Is this the manWho shook the earth,Who made realms tremble,Who made the world like a wasteAnd wrecked its towns,Who never released his prisoners to their homes?”All the kings of nationsWere laid, every one, in honorEach in his tomb;While you were left lying unburied,Like loathsome carrion,Like a trampled corpseIn the clothing of slain gashed by the swordWho sink to the very stones of the Pit.

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D. G. Myers

A critic and literary historian for nearly a quarter of a century at Texas A&M and Ohio State universities, I am the author of The Elephants Teach and ex-fiction critic for Commentary. I have also written for Jewish Ideas Daily, the New York Times Book Review, the Weekly Standard, Philosophy and Literature, the Sewanee Review, First Things, the Daily Beast, the Barnes & Noble Review, the Journal of the History of Ideas, American Literary History, and other journals. Here is the Commonplace Blog’s statement of principles, such as they are.